Situation: No power to cig lighter. No power to cig lighter fuse either. Fuse is fine. Fusible links are also fine. Everything else electrical unaffected. Testing occured with vehicle running and not running.

How It Happened: While using a power inverter from cig lighter, it became neccessary to operate a hair drier out of this device. With heat setting off and fan on low the invertor kept whining about not enough power so I started vehicle. Still whining so I revved the engine while standing next to vehicle drying hair. After about 20 seconds the power supply was lost. No sparks flew, no noises of invisible sparks, no smell of anything melting. Testing proves the above description of situation is accurate.

Question(s): What happened? Why didn't the fuse for the cig lighter blow instead of something else further up?
As no other electrical was interfered with then what am I looking for in solving the problem?
I have looked for inline fuses and can only find the stereo one.
I have looked for melted wires leading from battery to vehicle interior and all seems normal. Is it possible wires that connect to back of fuse box somehow blew off...?(no current to Cig Light fuse receptacle). Actually, I just checked that. Fused box backside connections seem in order...
Is there any other things someone might recommend I look for?


If there is a forum more appropriate for my question please refer...
Thanks in advance if so...
Blackfish

 

Welcome to the forum Blackfish.

When you said you checked the fuaible link, was that the one that is right behind the lighter socket?

On my old '90 truck I had, it was right behind the lighter itself, and I cut it out and soldered just a plain wire back in and bypassed it altogether.

 

Hey, thanks for reply. I was actually checking the fuseable links coming off the battery as no power was getting to the fuse box where the Cig Fuse sits. I also pulled the fuse panel off to check rear connections for one, or an online fuse and found nothing.

I am stumped...

 

the same thing happened to me after abusing my electrical system with a power inverter that was too small to drive the load i had hooked up to it.

i also was unable to find the blown fuse so i took it to the stealership and they fixed it within 2 minutes.

i'm going back there tomorrow and will ask what it was for you.. if the same mechanic is there

b

 

After toiling away many moments trying to figure it out I discovered a small fusible link right on the cig lighter...a tiny thing the size of 1/3 a grain of rice. I bypassed it with a piece of copper and all works lovely now. (Save the fact my car was broken into the day after I fixed it and my inverter and tunes were lifted...grrr...)

 

Yep, that is exactly the one I was talking about, and as mentioned above, I put in a piece of wire to replace the little bugger.

It's a shame Toyota uses one there, and confuses people.

 

case closed - thanks

 

Its funny that this got posted- I've been scratching my head trying to figure out why my lighter wasn't working either, just figured I'd ignore the problem altogether. Can someone describe what a fusible link is? Is it basically a fuse that once burnt out breaks the circuit? Not much of an electrician...

 

You're right - its basically a fuse. Here is one definition I found:

"Designed to perform the same task as a fuse, but resembles a wire. Fusible links are commonly used in ignition switches and other high current circuits."

My guess is they're cheaper than a real fuse (no holder, etc.) and more crude (less control over just how much current is needed to blow them and for how long), so they're used in places like the main battery wire or a cig. lighter.

Alan